January 5, 2006

Me: I feel like this is a political test.... I'll take two sheets of each.

I use my credit card and, to sign the receipt, I grab the pen-on-a-chain that isn't underneath my bag. It's at the left side of the counter and has a sign that reads "For southpaws only." I use my right hand.

Post office guy: That's for southpaws only.

Me: Yeah, I saw that. Now, I'll have to become left-handed. Government orders.

Yeah, well, obviously, I need some coffee. I set up my stack of bluebooks at Starbucks.

I do the NYT crossword and read half of a law review article. The music is piercing, squealy singing about passionate love. I'm sitting by the window. This is the view:

Isn't it weird how buying stamps is sort of a weird political thing? I live in an area that is a fairly even mix of post-college liberal hipsters, hispanics and orthodox Jews (a quintessentially American place, don't you think?) and I've had lots of similar exchanges at the post office here. I remember wanting to buy Ronald Reagan stamps, half because I think he was an interesting and important figure, half because I wanted to shock and horrify people on my mailing list as I did when I excitedly bought a sheet of Nixon stamps in the 90s. The postal clerk said "we don't have any Reagan stamps" loudly through the speaker causing the hipsters in line to glare at me (we have a bullet-proof screen between the clerks and the customers here in New York, hence the speaker; I once impertinently asked if the screen was to protect them from our bullets or us from their bullets).

When I went to buy the Buckminster Fuller stamps, the clerk first acted like she never heard of them, then when shown the poster of the stamp in the lobby, told me they were sold out and asked if Bucky was a cartoon charater (you have to see the stamp to understand why) and if I had heard of the upcoming Muppet stamps.

When I asked for the Garbo stamp: complete bewilderment. "We don't have!" said with as much panic and hesitation as if I had asked for a Richard Speck stamp.

This Christmas I thought I would be cute and ask for the Lorenzo Monaco stamp (which was the artist who painted the Madonna and Child panel painting on the Christmas stamp from the post office website). No response, so I asked for the Madonna and Child stamp. Bewilderment from the Asian clerk. I remembered that the USPS website called it the "holiday traditional" stamp so I asked for that and she responded "Oh, the Jesus stamp! We don't carry those anymore!" I looked at the tv hanging in the lobby and expected to see that Gibson guy from Fox news smirking down at me knowingly, but it was tuned to Oprah.

"Those are for southpaws only" -- now do you see what I mean about rulebound Wisconsinites?

Palladian: Hilarious. It reminds me of the scene in the Woody Allen movie (was it "Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex"?) where he's trying to buy a girlie magazine surreptitiously and the cashier calls out loudly for a price check.

I for one especially appreciate the photo of the view. If I look out the window immediately to my right, I see our orange tree about to keel over from all the fruit on it -- I really should get out from behind this keyboard and harvest, but I'm just not in the mood. It's too hot out!

Ah yes, the view from Starbucks of the local coffee house (Victor's) that Starbucks put out of business.

But isn't the Steep & Brew on University Ave. still around? That's right next to that Starbucks, closer than Victor Allen's. I once heard an employee at that Starbucks encourage a customer who wanted flavored coffee to go to Steep & Brew (while sells flavored coffee, unlike Starbucks). So I'm not so sure that Starbucks has this evil plot to go around putting local cafes out of business. Or, if they do, they don't seem to be doing a very good job of it. See also Espresso Royale on State St., right across the street from a Starbucks; Ancora Coffee Roasters on King St., a block away from a Starbucks. Those cafes seem to have been doing just fine for years.

Anti-Sheck: You realize you have no sense of humor, don't you? Or no... I guess you would naturally also lack the sense of whether you have a sense of humor. I do hope you manage to find some way to enjoy life. Maybe substance abuse? I don't know. I can't think of another solution for you.

RLC: I thought of that too! I think you're right that it's from "Everything You Wanted To Know About Sex...".

Pastor Jeff: Strangely enough, that image of Bucky wasn't created for the stamp, but comes from a Time Magazine cover from 1964. I love it, it's much more interesting than a lot of the "People" stamps, though the engraving style of the Garbo stamp is nice, and I like these Lewis and Clark stamps (since I love the look of old stamps).

Upon rereading my earlier post, I realize that it seems like my post office never has any stamps. Well, that's an accurate characterization! Unless you want the flag stamps or other standard pedestrian stamps, you're out of luck! I have to go to Grand Central to get any "fancy" stamps! I don't even know why I buy all these stamps, since I hardly ever send out letters!

I honestly can't remember the last time I used a stamp. Sort of sad, actually.

I ordered a bunch of custom stamps as gifts for family from photostamps.com. I had them made with various photos of my toddler son, but I thought about getting some with my photo before I lost weight and some with a recent photo and asking relatives to vote for either "Fat Jim" or "Skinny Jim" as the official "Jim Stamp" of 2006.

You should check out the custom postage route. You'll never have to deal with surly post office worker on the matter again.

JA Cohen: I was trying to figure out where the author was taking that photo. Thanks for the grid coordinates. Who knew there were so many coffee houses in Madison these days? It was just Victor's and Steep 'n Brew back in my day.

Professor A: were you seething "Newman!" when you left the post office?

I went right past that site last Thurs morning when I had to catch a 6AM flight at Dane Co airport (nice renovations there, btw). Those shrubs along Univ Ave were all lit up with diff-colored Xmas lights.